Good Job, Brain! - 126: I'll Take It To Go

Episode Date: September 11, 2014

MOVERS & SHAKERS, this one's for you! Ever wondered about the things you bring with you when you're on the go? We share quizzes, trivia, and history about some iconic portable necessities: how the Nintendo Game Boy ruled the world and the genius behind it, we sure love our beverages and Colin's got a quiz about drinks on the go. And of course, FOOD - trivia about Chinese takeout, and the brilliant model of the fast food drive-through window. After you digest that food on the go, maybe stop by a portapottie? Because Dana has a whole quiz on THAT. Of course. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to an Airwave Media podcast. Hello, brilliant and Breeney, breathing bros and bronisorses. Welcome to Good Job, Brain, your weekly quiz show and offbeat trivia podcast. This is episode 126. And of course, I'm your humble host. Karen, and we are your cacophony of quiz-crunching cookie cohort co-hosts. I'm Colin. I'm Dana. And I'm Chris. If you're not a bro, you're a brontosaurus.

So pick a side. Quick listener, thank you. I went to Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle the last weekend and met a couple of Good Job Brain listeners. And one of them, his name is Kevin, and he gave me a stack of books for all of us, thus forming

the seed or the genesis of the Good Job Brain Library. which we all own and none of us owns. One of the books that he gave me is called A Hog on Ice and Other Curious Expressions. It's a book of where did colorful English language idioms come from? That'd be helpful for me. This is interesting. Baker's Dozen is in here.

Baker's Dozen, of course, being 13 instead of 12 loaves of bread or whatever. It says that in England, Parliament enacted a law in 1266 for regulating pieces of bread. by weight with severe penalties for shorting somebody on the weight of loaves of bread. So because bakers, rather than weigh everything, they would just throw in an extra low. Yeah, basically. Just in case. Yep. It became known as the inbred, I-N-B-R-E-A-D, or Vantage Loaf.

The Vantage Loaf. That's great. Because it gave a vantage or a chance to the bakers to obey the law. It gave you an advantage, advantage loaf. Vantage Loaf sounds like a business term, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah. Okay, so the Vantage Loaf, we're going to capitalize on that. So the 13th in a Baker's Dozen is known as the Vantage Loaf.

Thank you very much, Kevin. That's fine. That's a good pub quiz team name is Vantage Loaf. People are like, what's that? I will continue our housekeeping portion of the show. Before we get to the trivia, I have an installment of our omissions and errors segment, affectionately called. um actually this is hands down my favorite um actually that we've ever done okay i had so much fun correcting and researching this one so a couple episodes ago on the all about butts uh episode

uh i was talking about etymologies of various butt and booty related words and i had mentioned that the sources i had checked for bootylicious showed that it was as late as 1998 and dana you were skeptical right when we were recording. And sure enough, we had more than one listener wrote in and said, I swear I could remember Snoop Dog using the word Bootylicious in the Dr. Dre song from the chronic in 1993. Three. Yeah. So I decided to get to the bottom of Bootylicious. So yeah, thank you. One of the advantages of having a wife who is in academia means that I have by extension access to the full OED, Oxford English Dictionary online. I know that's a perk you love the ticket.

So, sure enough, I went on to OED Online. Bootylicious, adjective, slang, originally, United States. 1992, Snoop Doggy Dog from this song with Dre Day. There's a profanity in the title. We'll just say it's Dre Day. Okay. Them rhymes you were kicking were quite Bootylicious. Wow.

So not only dated to 1992, but credited to Snoop Dog. He is the originator of record as far as the OED is concerned. And as I think listener Bobby pointed out, and as the OED notes as well, the original meaning, it wasn't like, you know, in a sexual sense or anything good. He meant it as a slam. Like he was talking about another rapper. And when he's saying, your rhymes were booty-licious, he meant like their bad. They tasted like the butt. Yeah.

Oh, okay. Their official definition. It tasted like butt. Their official definition, bootylicious, bad or weak? Oh, like a butt. Yeah. So it was not until later that it kind of took on the destiny's child meaning of booty-licious. Right, right, right.

It's like, yeah, your rhymes taste like doo-doo. That makes sense. So there we go. 1992, documented Snoop Dog. Thank you very much. All right. Another note from a listener, listener, Jenna made a comment on the blog. blog post for our latest all-quiz Bonanza and pointed out something that I had no idea about

is that the quiz that I did, which was 13L in a BD. Oh, the abbreviations quiz. Right, the abbreviations quiz, was actually created, as so many of these things are, by Will Shorts, crossword editor for the New York Times and Mr. Mr. Puzzles, exactly, for Games magazine back in the late 70s early 80s. Wow. And as Jenna put it, it was rapidly sort of ripped off and shared without attribution as Xerox lore. Yeah. Xerox lore.

That was a big thing. Pre-internet. Fax lore. They also kind of called it. The spreading of folk information and games and puzzles and humor by Xerox machines and faxes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Nobody updated it. Awesome.

All right. Well, that was a lot of housekeeping. We're ready for our first general trivia. segment, pop quiz, hot shot. 30 minutes later. All right. Here we go. I have a random trivial pursuit card, and you guys have your morning radio zoo buzzers.

Here we go. Blue Edge for geography. A branch of what art museum attracted over a million visitors to the Basque region of Spain in its first year of Operation. Colin. Oh, that's the Guggenheim in Bilbao. Yes. It is the Frank Gehry building known as the Wavy Silver Building.

Right, right. All of his buildings are wavy of the fraycarey buildings. They're wavy. All right. Pink Wedge for pop culture. What animated buddies got their star mocking music videos on NTV? Everybody. Beavis and Budhead.

Oh, it would have been great for two episodes ago. Oh, yeah, that's true. It was random. It's random. It's random. It's random. Yellow Wedge. What last name did Melinda French take in 1994 when she wed her company,

CEO. Oh, Chris. That would be Gates. Yes. She married Bill. Bill. Yes. Bill Gates.

I was just reading the bill. Oh, yeah. I'm not being sassy. Oh, God. There are a lot of notes on these cards these days. All right. Purple Wedge. What artist put a shark in formaldehyde creating an artwork that eventually sold for $8 million.

Collin knows this one? I think that's Damien Hurst. There's only one. Holy cow. That's him. He, in fact, did do a cow as well. He's done some large-scale... The split cow.

The sliced cow, right? Yeah. That was also Damien Hirst. It's very weird and gross. All right. Green Wedge for science. What was the first animated feature film generated completely on computers? College.

I think that's usually credited as Toy Story, right? Yeah. Correct. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was also the highest-grossing film of 1995. Wow. Wow, that is almost 20 years ago?

Wow. All right. Last question. Orange Wedge. What whiskey-based liquor is mixed with cranberry and lime juices to make a Scarlet O'Hara? What? Whiskey-based liquor. Oh, I mean, is it bourbon?

Incorrect. No, is it a whiskey-based? Liquor. Liquor? Liquor. Is mixed with what now? Cranberry and lime juices to make a scarlet o'clock. Hair, which is Southern.

What's a whiskey brandy? No. That's why we said bourbon. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Southern. The answer is Southern Comfort. Oh, okay. So Southern Comfort is not whiskey.

But it's a whiskey-based. Yeah, I knew it was its own little thing. So-Cone is one of those kind of alcohol that doesn't really... You're going to mix it with Lyme. Well, with Karen. And I actually have one challenge. Challenge trivia question for everybody, but mostly directed towards Colin. Jay Kramer, an 11-year-old, wrote it and asked us some sport trivia question.

He wrote, which city has the most sports champion titles? Ooh, most sports champion title. Okay, well, I mean just... So, including MLB baseball, NBA basketball, NFL football, NFL football, NHL hockey. Hitch. New York City? So, like, like, the Celtics are going to skew it toward Boston. The Red Wings are going to skew it toward Detroit.

The Lakers are going to skew it toward L.A. I don't know. Boston's got football and hockey as well. Boston? Chris is right. It is New York City. Right, right. And they're right.

Because, like, between, like, the Yankees and the Giants. They got, like, New York City. It's right. They got 20-something, yeah. New York City has 35. MLB champions Oh, okay, yep Total number of 50

Of the four major sports Who, what city do you think is number two? It's not Boston It's Boston Oh, okay Boston with 35 total Yeah So New York's got the feet budget

And like half of those are the Celtics, yeah Yes So number one New York City But most time in pub quiz They will ask you for number two No Yeah, you're right Number two's number two

Everybody knows number one What is number two? Everyone except for college Everyone except for Colin. Chris and I looked at each other like, hey, why'd you poop on our victory? I know. Like any idiot. Like, as any functioning adult knows.

Right. And a monkey off the street. I was like, sorry. I didn't mean to do that. I know. It's okay. Oh, whew. All right.

All right. Well, thank you, J. Kramer. Thank you. the other day I was on the train and I was brainstorming topics for this week's episode and I was like oh you know what like I look around and everybody has their headphones on everybody's reading everybody has like something they're working on something like on the go you know someone has a water bottle someone's probably listening to podcast or music and someone's reading a book so I was like oh we should do an episode on things on the go things we bring with us so this week we're taking it to go I'll start us off with a quiz talk called I'll start us off with a quiz called drinks to go Again Not one for the road

You know thought about it But it's not all of that stuff in the car So it's all around beverages that are portable in one way or another situations where you might take a drink with you, I think you guys will figure out the theme as we are designed for you to carry. Yeah, yeah. Cup holders in cars. Wow.

I mean, especially in America these days, it's, I mean, you'd be hard pressed to buy a car that did not have at least one cup holder in it today. I don't think I've ever seen a car without one. So, you know, it really started, it really started becoming the norm in the 90s. And that was going to just sort of just hit, you know, peak cup holder. holder was in the 1990s. By the end of the decade, yeah. I mean, most cars not only had one, but...

In the 80s, it was definitely like, oh, you have a cup holder in your car. That's cool. But now it's like that you must have cup holders all the time. I remember when I was a kid. I mean, I guess they still sell these, but it wasn't uncommon to see the little... Oh, yeah. You would buy the aftermarket cup holder that just hooks over the window. Yeah.

Yeah. Auto manufacturers caught on. I think I can say that this reached its zenith with the 1997 Chevrolet venture minivan. So I want you to guess. We're going to go closest to, closest to without going over. We'll be prices right. How many cup holders came in the 1997 Chevrolet Venture? I will tell you that it was the most number at that time that had ever been put into a American vehicle. It was a minivan. And let's just go around with your guesses. Okay. Okay. 15. I'm going to guess a I was going to guess 12.

Karen is closest. Really? Okay. The 97 Chevy Venture had 17 cup holders. Wow. For a vehicle that seats eight people. Oh, what? Two drinks per person?

I was thinking it was one of those minivans that has three rows of rear seating. Or not a minivan, but, you know, like three rows of seating, three people in each row gets you to nine and then 10, 11 for the two front seats. But no. Don't forget. On the car sides, too. So not like a cup holder's in the middle. So, of course, you need to be able to put your drink on the left or you're right, of course. Yeah, so you could be safely hydrated as a drink, no matter where you were, a drink within our brief.

That's right, that's right. Let me start with a little story here on this next question. The first time I ever went on an extended hiking trip, I think I was about 13. I was away at sleepaway camp, you know, so we were going off into the wilderness for a few days. And he never came back. then who was podcast And who was podcast And part of the fun of the trip was

We were allowed to pack everything we wanted We could take whatever we wanted Because we're all carrying our own bags And it was basically on us You know They encouraged us to pack to bring a lot of water You need to stay hydrated Especially when your kids out and you know

hiking around the wilderness So you know I loaded up like six canteens Full of water Put in them out You know because I didn't want to get to hide right Exactly I wanted to be prepared So I throw it a bag

bag on my back and I realized, holy crap, water's really heavy. The water's like really heavy. So I took a few of them out. All of this to lead up to my question to you guys, how much does a gallon of water weigh? Oh. And I can see Chris's gears turning because he knows a secret mnemonic that might help him here. I do know the secret mnemonic. I just can't remember how many. Yes. All right, Chris. You want to take a stab at it? A gallon of water weighs. Stalling.

Oh, my God. Eight pounds. You are very close, yes. Eight in a third pounds. Okay. A little bit. Can I have, yes, can I get the double you on that one?

Absolutely. All right. And, Chris, I think you were the one who mentioned the mnemonic on our show. I may have. Of a pints, a pound. The world around. That's right. So it was just a question of me remembering how many pints are in a gallon.

Yeah. So eight and a third. pounds for you scientifically minded listeners at standard temperature and pressure. Oh, you can use those weights then? Yeah, you could. Sure. Yeah. The thermos beverage container was introduced in 1904. Of course, the main selling point of the thermos is it keeps hot, liquids hot, keeps cold, liquids cold.

But tell me, how does a thermos work? Karen. Oh, wasn't in? Oh, I didn't know. Go for it. That's fine. There is a vacuum space between the, you know, you know, you know. container that has the liquid and then the outer container there's a vacuum yeah absolutely right

there's used to be glass and and metal right yeah often often glass it can be metal and metal it can be yeah yeah but yeah like i don't think like i don't think they use glass anymore for they don't they don't for most yeah sure yeah just for safety reasons but the point is it is not it's not the it's not the thing it's the absence of the thing yep the original vacuum flask uh is commonly called a doer flask uh after james doer scottish who basically invented the modern design for it and sort of shared the design with the founders of thermos. He didn't want like patent or anything on it. He's like, here's you go. Here's this cool thing. Wow.

This is interesting. I did as a side-side note, I learned thermos has become a genericized trademark. No, really? Yeah. In the 60s, it was declared. Oh, really? So like aspirin or zipper. It's you can call a, you can call a. No, not Xerox is not. Yeah. Xerox and Velcro are ones that are not. Right. They're fighting hard to keep it.

That's very interesting. I thought that Thermis had successfully fended it off thus far. Yeah, that's what I read. Wow. All right, last one here. This beverage brand, named after an Italian island, was introduced in 1969 and has been known from the beginning for its distinctive packaging. Capri Sun. Capri Sun.

Yes. Yes. Distinctive packaging. I had always assumed this was a total. American invention. It's not. It was German originally. I thought it was named for the pants. They make good stuff. Capri.

No. Is it a tetrapack? It's not a tetrapack. It's like a foil pouch. It's a bag. It was a foil bag. Yeah. Rudolf Wild of Germany, the Wild company. He specifically wanted to sell a drink with novel packaging. Like that was his goal. He's like, I want to come out with something that has packaging that no one's ever seen before, and this will be its selling point. Screw efficiency.

Genius. It's so true. So it's not even like there was a special reason for the packaging. He just wanted to make the craziest packaging. Yeah. Apparently a packaging salesman showed in the pouch. He's like, that's it. There's my container.

It just doesn't even taste that good, but it is fun. Like everybody's had it. I had so much Capri-Son as a kid. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. The original Capri-San. No. I learned they are very proud of the fact.

The all the original Capri-Sons were all natural. Like that was one of their main selling points. All natural ingredients. Sure. What about these days? Astorium is also all natural.

That's right. Just have this mental image of somebody holding up a beaver and just squeezing it. Going into a bag marked caprice. It's an assembly line. All natural. You put a straw in the beaver butt. Right.

Yeah. That. Now that's original packaging. Very cool. I have an excerpt from a New York Times article from 1980. Here you go. Josh Lansing and the young blonde woman he had never even met before, but as they passed each other on Madison Avenue,

the other afternoon, she waved and smiled and he tipped his headphones and salute. This, it should be understood, is not your stereotypical pickup. It was rather a stereophonic encounter. What the two well-dressed strangers first noticed about each other was that they were both possessors of the newest status symbol around town, the Walkman, affordable stereo unit, priced in most stores at $200, consisting of an ultra-light headphone set plugged into a cassette player that weighs at less than 14 ounces, batteries included. It's just like Mercedes Benz owners honking when they pass each other on the road,

explained Lansing. His cassette hung from his Gucci belt. The woman was strapped around perfectly tan shoulders. That's just a little taste of the people at the cutting edge. of personal audio entertainment. Wow, the Walkman. The Walkman. It was released publicly in Japan in 1979.

One of the leaders of Sony didn't like the name Walkman. He hated the name Walkman, but they'd already started promoting it. In America, it was called the Soundabout for a moment. They went to Walkman, Disc Man. It was such a big deal. Oh, yeah. Such a big deal. I mean, listening to some of these people, it's kind of the complaints against Google

last now. Oh, it's so interesting. Oh, like, people think they're, they're d-bags? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. Just like a Mercedes binz owner's honking at each other. Right, right, right, right. It's like an ostentatious status symbol when you're the very first one. When you're the very first one.

Well, it was like you really need to be like out and about in public listening to your own private music. Well, but the idea was just like, oh, well, I mean, why are you doing that? It's ridiculous. There you go. It's the thinking man's box was the opinion of a man in a pinstripe suit who said he was listening to a business meeting I missed in my secretary taped sure yeah well I mean you know prior to this like music was very much like you know it was a piece of furniture in your house you know like I love this one Mark Lavasco takes his walkman plus a backpack of cassettes when he

goes discoing when he goes discoing I don't like the DJ's choice of music he said I play my own and I'm happy yeah dancing dancing to your own music yeah that did not okay and then Backpack full of cassette tapes. That was my favorite. The Walkman, even the cassette walkman, they stopped producing them in Japan just in 2010. They still make them in the United States. Whoa. I mean, how many cassettes do you have?

How else are you supposed to play those tapes now? Right, right. It's also probably just so cheap at this point, I would imagine. Yeah. And talk about, like, you know, names becoming genericized. Like, I remember as a kid, any grown-up, like to a grown-up, any. portable device was a walkman. It didn't matter what manufacturer

was. I'm sure that just killed Sony. I'm sure they hated that. Well, they had like the Walkman, the Disc Man, the whatever man, but now Walkman is their CD one. Oh, yeah. Like all of them are just Walkman. They're just Walkman. That's right. I guess it makes sense. They were smart not to have tape in the name or cassette.

Oh, back to Google Glass. Do you know what people who are new to the Google Glass, who are the first of the Google Glass? I know what people call them, but I don't know what they call. They call themselves, like, pioneers, right? Explorers. Explorers. That's a trivia question.

That's, yeah, explorers, okay. I know what other people call. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah. Things, not. It rhymes with a glass bowl. Yeah. Have you guys, have you tried them yet?

No. I know you have. I have. Oh, you have. I've never tried them. Yeah, they're fine. It's so, it's so useful that I think when it becomes mass market price that you're going to start seeing it whether it's whether it's

whether it's shaped like google glass or whether it's something else that's built into eyeglasses or other kind of headwear like i think i think we'll start seeing more of that yeah yeah i was thinking about the jawbone and i feel like the jawbone also got kind of everybody was using it what's the jawbone i don't even know what it's that oh yeah that thing yeah but then it stopped right people stopped talking on the phone yeah people sort of just started texting everything via yeah exactly it was really that that was a weird era for me because you stopped being able to tell

who was a crazy person on the street ranting about conspiracy theories and who was just like on a business call. Ranting about conspiracy. Well, if we're going to talk about the Walkman, we should probably also discuss the Game Boy.

I'm pretty sure, I mean, nobody ever from Nintendo ever said, yes, we named our portable video game machine the Game Boy to take little dig at Sony's Walkman, but that's probably where it was a dig where like, this will make marketing easier. A playful, sort of, yeah. I don't know.

It's a great name, though. Until you said that, I never thought about that until you said that. Walkman, Game Boy. Portable video games are very big business for Nintendo. In fact, depending on how you count it, it's their biggest business. Nintendo has sold 273 million home video game machines, like the Super Bowl. for Nintendo or the GameCube or the Wii. Nintendo has sold just under 400 million portable gaming machines. So it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's,

if you have two kids, you buy one console, but you need two portable ones. And then, and then they hit you with upgrades. So the game boy, as with many early Nintendo games and creations, was, uh, primarily considered to be the child of gun pay yokey, who was one of Nintendo's, and engineers. He had been with the company, he was a mechanic working on the machines where they were making playing cards and toys all throughout their transformation from playing cards in the 1800s, you know, into toys, into electronic toys, into video games. And his philosophy, I'm going to speak some Japanese here, so get ready for this. He had distilled his philosophy for product or, you know, inventions down into this phrase, which is, Kareta gijitsu no suihei shiko. And that is lateral thinking with withered technology. Wither technology or seasoned technology, sometimes translated up as a withered as a plant withers, technology that has withered.

So basically what this means is taking cheap stuff, taking technology that's already been used, that's no longer cutting edge, but using it in a unique way. This explains a lot of what Nintendo has done with video games. I mean, this is the philosophy of the Wii, which used old, like, technology that was five years old, but in a different way. Maxing it out or just... One major example of this was one day in the late 70s, Yoko Yi was writing the Shinkansen, and he saw a businessman playing, to kill time, playing with an LCD calculator. Just pressing the buttons, watching things happen. The LCD calculator was hot stuff in the early 80s. I mean, there was the LCD calculator.

Everybody had to have an LCD calculator, whether you needed it or not. It's just so cool. It's true. It's true. And the technology at that point was really cheap because of economy of scale. Everybody wanted one, so they were making tons and tons of these LCD screens. Just to clarify, this is a calculator, right? Calculator. Okay. Calculator with the early 80s.

I was transfixed with the LCD calculator, but I was a very little kid, so it was just like whatever. I didn't know what versions. of calculator came before that. Were there other ones? Well, there were like mechanical calculators. Oh, okay. That one sounds true. Like the handheld calculator.

Yeah. I mean, I think there were calculators that used like, I remember like plastic calculators that used entirely mechanical. Like gears and stuff. Yeah, like you punched the numbers in and it would turn gears and add things up for you. That's amazing. I wouldn't get to know. That's fun.

But LCD calculators, big deal. So this is how Gunpei Yokoi invented a game end watch. which was the LCD screen, right? They only played one game. But the screen was a calculator. You know, it was just, it just, the calculator just caused certain areas of the LCD screen to light up to show numbers. But they just used it for, like, stick figures and balls and things like that. A little aliens dropping.

Mario and Donkey Kong and whatever, right. And he also invented the, what is called the D-pad, the cross-pad that used to control things, which eventually would end up on the Nintendo Entertainment System and the Game Boy. Right. Because they needed something that wasn't. to joystick to control things. Yeah. Up, down left, right. And Nintendo still has the patent on that.

So that's why nobody else can like legally like... Oh, really? You see, I mean, the PlayStation has it, but it's slightly different to get around the patent. Because the PlayStation, it's, you notice it's like four separate buttons. Uh-huh. That's getting around Nintendo's patent of that plus design. Oh, that's really interesting. Every time somebody makes a new video game system and they want to do that,

they have to like come up with their own, like, slight different take on it. That's right. Yeah, with like the Xbox, you know, for the Xbox 360s pad was like this weird kind of like, it was almost like a joystick, it was like a be a circle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So a decade later, after making Game and Watch in the early, early part of the 80s, Nintendo applies this lesson of, you know, let's use withered technology in a novel way. I mean, computer sizes had shrunken so much at that point that, like,

it was becoming possible to make a portable video game machine. In fact, it was totally possible late, late 80s, early 90s, to do. a portable game machine that had a color screen that was roughly equivalent in power to the home video game consoles that were on the market you could even put a 16-bit graphics chip in there and do some really cool stuff and a lot of gaming hardware makers

all kind of had the same idea at the same time but the difference with what Nintendo did was their priority was not let's make this thing super powerful and knock your socks off it was let's make it inexpensive let's give it the most battery life that we can possibly give it. So Nintendo's competitors, early competitors, in the portable gaming space,

Sega's game gear, the Atari Links, the Turbo Express, they had beautiful graphics, they had color screens, they were battery vampires. You would put six AAAs into a Sega game gear. And there were two separate battery compartments, three batteries and three batteries, and they'd be dead in like a couple of hours. So if you're a kid, like, you know, constantly having to, like, get more batteries, that's a huge expense, right? And if you're a parent, it's like, I don't want to give you all these batteries. Nintendo, 4 AA batteries in the original Game Boy, 15 to 20 hours of game.

Yeah, it was a lot. You get tons of gameplay out of it. Yeah, that's like a whole plane flight and a plane flight back. I remember. Up and down the eastern seaboard. Once that red light comes on, you're like, oh, no, the red light comes on. You're like, oh, no, I've only got an hour left out of these things. where I got to swap the batteries.

Yeah. The screen, I mean, a lot of this was due to the screen. It was not color. It was not even, it was, it was four shades of gray, basically, is what the screen could do. It had no back light. So, I mean, like, famously, you had to, like, shine lights on it and make sure you got the right angle. And then instead of costing anywhere between, like, you know, $150 to $200, it cost $89.99. It wasn't even $99.99.

And it came with Tetris. Yeah. So you get a free game with your $89.99. It was so cheap. They sold millions, you know, between Japan, the U.S. and Europe, just, like, took off like a rocket. They really aimed it. If you look at the original Game Boy ads, they aimed it at, like, business people, you know,

because they knew kids were probably going to buy it. So they targeted the ads at like, oh, were you on this cross-country, L.A. to New York, long haul flight? Well, why don't you play golf on your Game Boy? I mean, even when it became feasible to do color graphics with good, battery life. Game Boy was such a runaway train that it was just impossible to compete with it and just kept going

and going and going. Just as Gameboy started to slow down a little, you know, just as people started to stop buying Gameboys, Nintendo in the craziest stroke of genius and luck released

Pokemon. The first Pokemon games were released in Japan in February 1996. This was a huge shock. The Game Boy apparently, prior to Pokemon, the Game Boy, according to one source I found, the year prior they had shipped a million Game Boys in Japan. Like, that's great. The year following that release of Pokemon, three million games. Wow. Okay. And it just took off again. And like eventually Nintendo did have to bow to market pressures and release a Game Boy with a

color screen and better technology. But they actually, they released the Game Boy Color in the year 1998. So Nintendo got almost 10 years of black and white graphics of the old Game Boy hardware, thanks in part to Pokemon reviving it. And again, like the Walkman, I remember as a kid, to a grown-up, any handheld gaming system is a Game Boy. That's right. If it's electronic and you're playing it, it's Game Boy. My dad will still, to this day, any handheld, oh, are you playing on your Game Boy or something there? Yeah. Yeah, oh, absolutely. Yeah, it was just cemented to him.

It was so funny. All right, let's take a quick break. A word from our sponsor. When Johann Rawl received the letter on Christmas Day 1776, he put it away to read later. Maybe he thought it was a season's greeting and wanted to save it for the fireside. But what it actually was, was a warning, delivered to the Hessian Colonel, letting him know that General George Washington was crossing the Delftain. Delaware and would soon attack his

forces. The next day when Rawl lost the Battle of Trenton and died from two colonial Boxing Day musket balls, the letter was found, unopened in his vest pocket. As someone with 15,000 unread emails in his inbox, I feel like there's a lesson

there. Oh well, this is the constant, a history of getting things wrong. I'm Mark Chrysler. Every episode, we look at the bad ideas, mistakes, and accidents that miss shaped our world. Find us at Constant Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. The creators of the popular science show with millions of YouTube subscribers

comes the Minute Earth podcast. Every episode of the show dives deep into a science question you might not even know you had, but once you hear the answer, you'll want to share it with everyone you know. Why do rivers curve? Why did the T-Rex have such tiny arms? And why do so many more kids need glasses now than they used to. to. Spoiler alert, it isn't screen time. Our team of scientists digs into the research and breaks it down into a short, entertaining explanation jam-packed with science facts and terrible

puns. Subscribe to Minute Earth wherever you like to listen. So I want to tell a story about a certain invention, and this object was invented in 1894 in America. And it was called the Oyster Pale, very easy to make, very cheap to make, just a little paper bucket. And it's supposed to, you know, a Pail. You're supposed to carry it like upright. So there are oyster stands. If you want it oyster, you go to the fish market into the oyster stand. And the thing is, they have the people who are selling them. Not only they're selling it to you, they're also preparing it. They would shuck the oyster for you because it's hard to do it by yourself. And then they would put all the shucked oysters in the oyster pail for you to take it to go back home. Okay. So in the mid-20th

century, the price of oysters went up because of overfishing. So now a lot of these manufacturers have all these oyster pails that are unused, kind of stocking up. Also, in the mid-20th century after World War II, there was a huge increase in prepared foods that can be purchased from restaurants. And at this time, especially post-war, Chinese food became really, really, really big. And so the oyster pail was quickly adopted for Chinese takeout. The oyster pail is that iconic Chinese takeout box. The white little folding cardboard. You are blowing my mind.

Yes. Not Asian. Yeah. Totally U.S. invention and for oysters. And it was actually really great for Chinese food because Chinese food usually is very saucy, oily, oily, hot. You know, it's not just like a sandwich box or something. It really can hold weird stuff, I guess,

re textured stuff. That's not a burger or a sandwich or a pizza. This became the iconic Chinese food takeout box. So this is what, like 1940s, 1950s? Yep. And so I was looking into dishes that you'd see in Chinese food places here in America and kind of looking around the origin to see if they're really Chinese or if they're U.S. made up or pseudo-Chinese or part Chinese.

The poo-poo platter. You know, what is the poo-poo platter? platter. It's appetizer. It's like, we're not appetizers, but like, it's a variety platter, sure, yeah, yeah, yeah. Is it a Hawaiian? It is Hawaiian.

Oh, okay. The poopoo platter probably first introduced to the states during, you know, the, the Tiki craze. Sure. The Polynesia craze. And the poop craze, which lasted is 1968, slightly later in 1968, before being quickly abandoned.

Oh, okay. I mean, the thing is, you can say, might be kind of Chinese inspired because there are Chinese people living in Hawaii, but really in Hawaii, Pupu is kind of like a canopase or little bites, little bits of food, kind of all together. P-U-P-U. Yeah, P-U-P-U. There is a Chinese name for it, but I think it's like a background or like a retcony. Oh, okay.

Right, but Pupu is from Hawaii. How many times can we get away with saying, yeah. Crab Rangoon. You see crab rangoon in a lot of that. Are you, wait, Karen, are you going to, are you going to sit here and tell me, ruin my entire life, and tell me that imitation crab and Philadelphia cream cheese is not authentic Chinese food that I've been eating a lie every Tuesday night for my entire life? One of the first places to serve crab rangoon is traitor vix. Yeah. Oh, okay, speaking of cheeky craze.

Really? Uh-huh. I kind of want to, okay, I want to go there now. We have a gift certificate. Yeah, we should. My Thai has run into there. Yep. Yeah.

And crab Rangoon? That's all I eat and or drink. My Thai crap Rangoon, my Thai crap Rangoon. I'm passed out by 1 p.m. Chris has gout. And scurvy. Yeah. Not a Chinese thing, Krab Rangoon.

Not to mention, like, Rangoon is not in China. I mean, I don't want to be too much of a nitpicker. The sources say that, like, it's based on maybe. be a Burmese recipe, but cream cheese and imitated crab. The cream cheese is the giveaway. Chinese chicken salad, not Chinese either.

What? Yeah. Came out in 1960s, kind of in the salad, you know, Hollywood. Oh, really? That early. Exotic phase. There was a restaurant in Santa Monica

called Madam Wu's. Like, this is kind of your pan Asian or California and Asian kind of entry. There are salads and there's chicken in the salads in Chinese cuisine, but not the chicken salad. There's one thing I have to talk about.

I've never heard before and so interesting called Yaka Maine. Yaka. Yaka Maine. Like Maine as in like low Maine or Chamaid. Oh, okay. Yaka Maine. It is a Chinese creole mashup local food item in New Orleans. Whoa.

That's awesome. What's in it? So in Taiwanese and Chinese cooking, there is beef noodle soup, which is very, very, very, iconic. This is a kind of a Creole American take on beef noodle soup where the noodle is spaghetti. Okay. And it has the soup

is stewed beef, like brisket. And then the broth has Cajun seasoning and bay leaves and chili powder and there's like a hard-boiled egg and green onion. Oh man. So it's like it's New Orleans Raman basically. Yeah, it is. Oh my God. Can somebody

send some to us? I think you could probably make it yourself. Yeah. They We talk about how this is a great hangover cure. Yeah. Well, I mean, sure. Yeah. Everything is right. Right.

It's spicy and it's hot and it's reminiscent of a Chinese beef noodle soup. Yacameen. I want to go to New Orleans and I want to eat Yacameh. Yacamein. We were just watching bizarre foods with Andrew Zimmern and there was an episode he was in Lima, Peru. And apparently there's a large group of ethnic Chinese and Japanese people who, in Lima have, like, established Peruvian Chinese food, you know, or Chinese Peruvian food or Peruvian Japanese food.

Chifa is, is the name for, like, Chinese food. It's very much the same way. It's like, yeah, it's mashup. It's done to their tastes. That's cool. So there you go. Some 411 on Chinese American food, probably the most popular takeout food. And also, the oyster ale.

I don't know what the normal name is called Chinese takeout food box. Yeah, I would just call it a China. Like, if I had to do, like, a stock image search, I would just search Chinese food carton or so carton, carton. Well, I don't know about you guys, but I live in America. And having to walk into a restaurant and take a takeout container is too hard. Too inefficient. Okay. So I would like to talk about that wonderfully American of inventions, the drive-thru window.

Now, we shall begin by defining our terms, especially if you do not live in America like me and have some other funny, funny, funny, word for it, like Cockney Rhyming slang or what. A drive-through window on a restaurant is distinct from a drive-in restaurant. A drive-in is a restaurant that does not have indoor seating. You drive your car into the parking lot. The waiter or car-hop comes to your car, takes your order, brings your food to your car, you eat it in the car. This was from an era in which everyone was in love with their car.

Yeah. And eating in your car sounded like the coolest thing. I associated very, very 50s in my mind. Indeed. So they drive through window. the restaurant inside may or may not have a inside seating area, but basically instead of even having to get out of your car, you pull up to the window, pay for and get your food,

and then importantly, drive off with your food. You don't sit there and eat it in the parking lot. You can if you want to. You can if you really want to, but if you're going to do that, why don't you just go inside. Exactly. You're on to go.

Here's your burger. Now get out. As memorialized in the name of the fast food place, in and out burger. Yes. There are a lot of different places that claim to have invented the drive-thru window, but in and out, the burger chain here in California and elsewhere, has a pretty solid claim to the invention of the modern-day drive-through window, which is intercom-based. You place your order into a speaker.

They take your order. You drive up to the window. You pay. You drive up to the next window. They hand you your food. And then again, importantly, in and out. The original In-N-Out, built in 1948, had no inside-season. and no parking lot.

So very, very clear. Come here's your burger. Don't care where you go with it. You can't stay here. Because there's someone right in line behind you. Exactly. Yeah, that's actually really efficient because then you don't have to pay that much for property, like area property.

That's the thing. It's super efficient. You can serve more people. I mean, you know, you're not paying for a lot of stuff. Yeah, exactly. Now, other burger chains began to add in drive-through windows. After In-N-Out, Jack in the Box was sort of an early kind of jumper on her with the drive-thru windows, Wendy's. So let me ask you this.

Another Brad Pitt or Lasers, which is older question. Which is older? McDonald's Drive-Thru or Colin? McDonald's Drive-Thru or Colin. I don't actually know how old Colin is. Collin is 67 years old. I'll say Colin.

Wow. If you had asked me just to name the year, I would have guessed much earlier. But I'm going to lean with Karen. I'll guess me. I'll guess that I'm older than McDonald's drive through. Yeah, I'll tell you. So in and out was founded in 1948. McDonald's was originally a barbecue restaurant in the 1940s,

and they converted over into fast food service burger place in 1948, same year. So really, it's asking you, How long, for Colin, especially because I'm pretty sure he knows what year he was born, how long did it take McDonald's to put the drive-thru window, is it before or after? I'm going to switch, McDonald's, but not by much. I think McDonald's. Colin, you are older than McDonald's drive-thru windows. Colin was born in 1974.

The first McDonald's drive-thru window was installed in 1975. Wow. Took him a long time. The impetus was there was a McDonald's in Sierra Vista, Arizona, and it was near a military base. The military men could not get out of their cars while they were still in fatigues. Like, they could drive off the base, but they couldn't get out of their cars. So they put in a drive-thru window at the McDonald's. By 1988, McDonald's was doing 51% of its business through the drive-through window.

If you think about it, on average, they were serving one car every 20. So you think people don't have to come in. They don't have to sit down. None of that stuff. The car comes up. You sell them the food. They leave. Nowadays, it's more like 60 to 70% of the business of a McDonald's with a drive-thru is done out the window. Oh, really? Wow. Here's another question for you guys. If today, if you have, let's say you're driving along the highway on a road trip, you want to get a drive-through, but you want your food the fastest of the major burger place. places, where would you go if you wanted the fastest food? Fastest food. Oh, that's a good question. Wow, that is good. So I'm going to, I'm going to guess in and out. I'm going to guess that they've mastered it.

I don't think so. I think they cook it. Yeah. And Burger King. Do they still do it your way? Because that takes a lot. Oh, right. Oh, so maybe it's the place that has the fewest options, like White Castle or something.

Windy's is very fast. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So QSR, quick serve restaurants, it is the trade industry. publication for the fast food business, does a annual drive-thru study. And in 2013, they found that the fastest of what they surveyed was Wendy's. Wendy's had an average time of 133 seconds from order to payment to food. 133 seconds.

The slowest chick filet was over 200 seconds. Now, that's still not a long time. That's still super fast to get your first. food. But if that extra minute counts, USA Today reported last year coming off the back of the survey that actually drive-through waiting times in general are actually getting longer and longer and longer. Does anybody want to guess why? People are slow. The menus are too complicated. That's my answer. Which one do you want to pick? And they're related. You have to read. There are a lot of options. Yeah. That's true. The answer is in fact, menu bloat.

And it's not only the fact that there's more options on the menu. To attract more customers, fast food places are making more and more complicated dishes at this point. With all kinds of different ingredients that have to be put on. fajitas and salad bowls that are custom handmade and all this wraps and all kinds of stuff where it's not just like burger fries and a Coke anymore. But to hear the QSR magazine tell it, customers actually aren't concerned as much with speed as they are with. What do you think the big one is for drive-thru customers? For me, it's accuracy. They better get that order right.

I get so mad when they get the order wrong. You are absolutely correct. Because you're driving away. You're not going to drive back and be like, you gave me the order. Oh, Colin drives back. Colin drives back if they get the order wrong. Right. And you're going to be super ticked off, like more so than if you had been waiting an extra 30 seconds for the order.

So actually, one of the things that people really, that these companies really work, on is accuracy. If you go and get drive through at Burger King, you need to check that bag. Burger King of the companies tested had the lowest accuracy score. 82.5% accuracy ready. That means that nearly one-fifth of the time you're giving you the wrong order. B-minus. You need to look in that bag. Good to know. Yeah. Throughout history, Royals across the world were notorious. for incest. They married their own relatives in order to consolidate power and keep their blood blue. But they were oblivious to the havoc all this inbreeding was having on the health of their offspring. From Egyptian pharaohs marrying their own sisters to the Habsburg's notoriously

oversized lower jaws. I explore the most shocking incestuous relationships and tragically inbred individuals in royal history. And that's just episode one. On the History Tea Time podcast, I profile remarkable queens and LGBTQ plus royals explore royal family trees and delve into women's medical history and other fascinating topics. I'm Lindsay Holiday and I'm spilling the tea on history. Join me every Tuesday for new episodes of the History Tea Time podcast, wherever fine podcasts are enjoyed. All right, and we have one quick quiz segment, Dana. All right, I don't know how we could have an episode about portable things, how we can have an episode about portable things.

Not just people in general, but. No, us specific and not have something about the porta potty. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Portaloo, Porta John. Okay. Oh, do they say Portaloo in England? They do.

Portaloo? Yeah. That's so cute. Sounds like a music festival All right So which toilet cubicle And a row of Portolouse Is the least used on average

Which one should you go to If you have read this before In bathrooms It is the one closest to the door So I'm going to go ahead and guess It's like the one that's closest to the line Full of the people that are waiting there It is the first one

Yeah I think because people don't want to do it right next to the line Right if you had a choice you'd move further away from everybody. That says a lot about, like, human psychology. So that's all, yeah, and the same, it's the same thing in a bathroom. So it's, yeah, I've heard that with urinals, yeah, the cleanest, urine, the cleanest, right. So the easiest to get to is not the one that's picked or the shortest.

Right. No, people want to get far away. Yeah, you want to go deep into the woods to take care of your business. Yeah. That makes sense. How many portable toilets were at Obama's inauguration? Oh, my. Was it?

Oh, multiple stories? I'll give you multiple stories. Okay. Because, I mean, how could you figure it out? 1,000, 5,000 or 15,000? 15,000. Yeah, whatever you said, I was going to pick the highest one. Highest one.

I'm going to stick with that. 5,000. What am I? Like, something. I'm just going to give you another. That's a lot of, that's more than a music festival. That's a lot. That's a lot.

That's a lot. You know, music festival, if somebody pees against a tree, eh, okay. Yeah. Obama's inauguration. If, like, Joe Biden is like, you know. Because he's the one you're worried about. Paul. It's like, I can't find a port of John. Yeah. You don't want that.

Keeping it classy. Exactly. Exactly. Okay. In the 1940s in Long Beach, California, the forerunner of the modern portable toilet was born. So that way workers in this industry could stay on the job longer. What industry? Long Beach, California in 1940s. I'll guess dock workers. Shipbuilders. The first shipbuilders. Shipbuilders. Go back.

No, it's a family show. People who build Large boats Ships Ship builder A heavy wooden box With a metal inside So there's privacy

And it was portable They can move it around Unfortunately like wood Start to smell bad After a while It was hard to clean So they tried like different Different types of materials

Sponge was a terrible idea The less set about it'd be better Yeah So Here's one Brad Pitt or Porta Potty's Yeah, the first patent on the Port-a-Pottie or Brad Pitt, which is older. The first patent on the Port-a-Pottie.

So Brad Pitt was 63. Brad Pitt, I believe, was born 63. I'll say Brad Pitt. I'll say Brad Pitt. Yeah, Brad Pitt is older. I'll say Port-a-Pottie. It was 62. It was right before bed-down.

How is that, like, what, constructed of plastic or fiberglass? Yes. Fiberglass holds smell, so it was plastic, yes. Yeah, they figured out the plastic in 62. Okay, true or false. There is a medically recognized word to describe a fear of porta-potties. Oh. A fear of paripotis.

True, absolutely true. I wish. I wish it were true. I looked so hard. No, there isn't, but there are specific fears of poop, of peeve, of public. public, but there's no specific one for that. For porta parties. Everybody wants one.

Give it time. There needs to be, yeah. Can we make up one? What would you see it? If you're a portal. Oh, we can make one up. You know what? Everyone,

this is the mission. You feel free to submit your ideas. In the comments are on Facebook. It's got to be Greek, right? Yeah, yeah. So Greek words for toilet or possibly like the act or an outside of public. May I suggest?

Plastropubia. You may not. Okay. All right. So you can suggest it, but we'll keep looking around. There was like, somebody had portophobia, but they're like, is that a fear of ports? That doesn't sound right. It has to be everything altogether, yeah, for sure.

All right. Okay. And then the last one. According to the BBC, which British monarch used a portable toilet that was shaped like a box covered with red velvet, trimmed with lace, and with a lid and with carrying handles. Do they have those on Amazon? Old school. I would assume old school With that like a caring thing

I'm going to guess it's going to be a queen I can't imagine like Henry the 8th would care about this I was going to guess like I'm going to say Queen Victoria Henry the 8th Is Elizabeth 1 Oh yeah So in 1596

Sir John Harrington introduced Queen Elizabeth To the first flushing toilet Yes yes So Harrington This is fascinating trivia to me Probably to you guys too but Kit Harrington, John Snow is a descendant

of Sir John Harrington. Holy cow. Oh my God. So you might say he has a claim to the throne. Oh, yes, get the throne. That's it. That's it. And this show is over.

Yeah, he knows something. Okay, yeah, mic drop. All right, we're going to end the show now. That was awesome. Thank you. Thank you guys for joining me. Thank you guys listeners for listening in. Hope you learned a lot of stuff about portable things,

Walkman, Game Boy, John Snow, Chinese food, and portable drinks, and more. You can find us on iTunes, on Stitcher, on SoundCloud, and on our website, good job, brain.com. Thanks for our sponsor, Audible, and we'll see you guys next week. Bye. From the terrifying power of tornadoes to sizzling summer temperatures,

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